String replaceAll problem

[Vadim Vararu]

Hi everybody. I've got a problem.

I have a string "uploads/sounds" and i try to do that -> "uploads/sounds".replaceAll("/", File.separator); Surprisingly, i get an error. Who knows what's the problem?

If a use something else instead of File.separator as second parameter for replaceAll, it goes allringht.

[Sridhar Santhanakrishnan]

Shouldn't you be using

   "uploads/sounds".replaceAll("/", System
				.getProperty("file.separator")) 

[Henry Wong]

Vadim Vararu wrote:
I have a string "uploads/sounds" and i try to do that -> "uploads/sounds".replaceAll("/", File.separator); Surprisingly, i get an error. Who knows what's the problem?

The second parameter to the replaceAll() method is *not* just a regular string. It is a regex replacement string. With a regex replacement string, the backslash has special meaning. So... if you run this with a Windows system, you should get an error, as a single backslash is not valid as a regex replacement string.

Henry

[Henry Wong]

BTW, if you don't want the special meanings to apply to the regex replacement string, you can also use the Matcher.quoteReplacement() method to quote out the special meaning.

Or you can just not used regexes parameters. as you can use the replace(String, String) method instead.

Henry

[Piet Verdriet]

Henry Wong wrote:

Vadim Vararu wrote:
I have a string "uploads/sounds" and i try to do that -> "uploads/sounds".replaceAll("/", File.separator); Surprisingly, i get an error. Who knows what's the problem?

The second parameter to the replaceAll() method is *not* just a regular string. It is a regex replacement string.

Correct: the second parameter is not an ordinary String, but it's not a regex String. The only thing special with it, is that variables are interpolated in it. In other words, the dollar sign is the only special character in the second parameter. The dollar sign followed by a number denotes the N-th match from the regex pattern (from the first parameter).

Henry Wong wrote:With a regex replacement string, the backslash has special meaning. So... if you run this with a Windows system, you should get an error, as a single backslash is not valid as a regex replacement string.

Henry

But, regardless of OS (*nix, Mac, Windows), all paths with a slash as separator will work just fine.
So, OP: I'd just keep using (relative) path names with the '/', also on Windows.

[Henry Wong]

Correct: the second parameter is not an ordinary String, but it's not a regex String. The only thing special with it, is that variables are interpolated in it. In other words, the dollar sign is the only special character in the second parameter. The dollar sign followed by a number denotes the N-th match from the regex pattern (from the first parameter).

I never said that the second parameter was a regex string -- I said the second parameter was a regex replacement string.

And the dollar sign is not the only character that has special meaning. The backslash is also special. It is needed if you want to actually replace with a dollar sign (or a backslash).

Henry

[Piet Verdriet]

Henry Wong wrote:

Correct: the second parameter is not an ordinary String, but it's not a regex String. The only thing special with it, is that variables are interpolated in it. In other words, the dollar sign is the only special character in the second parameter. The dollar sign followed by a number denotes the N-th match from the regex pattern (from the first parameter).

I never said that the second parameter was a regex string -- I said the second parameter was a regex replacement string.

...

Ah, I misunderstood your post.

Henry Wong wrote:The backslash is also special.

Of course!